I must firstly report what is tantamount to a lie. In late March Celebrity advertised that the free drinks package would cease by 31/3, so I booked before April. Come 1st April their standard offer included the free drinks package plus other extras. Simply do not believe their marketing gimmicks. In Autumn 2013 we enjoyed an Eclipse Mediteranean cruise. This time to Ireland and Iceland – and indeed it was “the President’s Cruise” – frankly I’m surprised they didn’t then try that bit harder. Before we set off we had problems for 2 or 3 weeks using their terrible web site, which kept freezing or crashing. Chose to park at the port – this worked very well. They took the cases from the car and we only had to walk 200yds. We were all done with embarkation within a few minutes, it went very smoothly. Obviously had to wait for cabin preparation, but they were ready ahead of schedule. We booked two linked cabins, deck 9, to cope with my terrible snoring. This worked very well, and with just two of us we had (just about) enough storage space and the luxury of 2 shower rooms and a double balcony. I feel this was a better option than a suite. Our attendant was excellent too. Eclipse is a nice liner with lots of friendly helpful staff, but I’m bound to compare it to 3 years previous – unfortunately nothing was an improvement. The Cruise Director was rubbish, or rather most of the entertainment he provided was. It was mostly amateurish. They have an excellent theatre, but we found ourselves deliberately sitting at the back, half expecting the need to walk out. One of the senior entertainment guys was an American DJ – we attended 2 quizzes he was responsible for and it was a waste of time as they were clearly aimed at an American audience.

We ate in the main restaurant which was to a good standard, and 3 times in speciality restaurants – Tuscan Grille - very good; Murano – not as good as they think they are; Qsine – definitely not as good as 2013. We ate several times in the large Oceanview Café – definitely worse than 2013, a lot of it no better than a motorway service station, but you have the convenience factor. I upgraded from the Classic drink package to Premium, thinking there would be some decent red wine, but there wasn’t anything that stood out. Rather than 2 formal nights they refer to them as Chic nights, which is very modern and you clearly have the choice of a formal dinner suit or effectively smart casual – unfortunately they didn’t police this to their published standard, so it was a bit tatty around the edges. Disembarkation worked well until we got into the luggage hall. There were large numbered signs where we would find our numbered suitcases, but we didn’t. After some frantic searching we found them much further away under a temporary numbered sign. Panic over and it was an easy 200yd walk to the car. And finally, having emailed them to point out they charged me twice for a Spa booking made before we travelled, their automatic response tells me they aim to deal with this within 28 days – could this be the final nail in the coffin for me?